How are Standards Developed

A standard is of value only if it is put to use, and therefore the users’ requirements and market relevance of a standard have to be clearly understood before the start of any standard development project. The different stages of standards development are given below:

New Work Item

Proposal for new work item shall be fully justified in relation to the benefits sought. Where possible, the requestor should provide the relevant inputs, documents and initial draft to facilitate the assessment and development of the new standard.

There should be sufficient wide support among the key users and stakeholders to give confidence that consensus can be reached in the development of the new standard.

Announcement of Work Commencement

Development of a new standard or initiation of review of an existing standard shall be publicly announced through a one-month public comment process. The announcement covers new work commencement or review initiation.

Development of a Draft Standard

In drafting the standard, it is essential to take into account the standards structure, templates and copyrights issues at an early stage to avoid potential delays prior to publication. The responsibility for the technical content of a draft standard remains with the Technical Committee / Working Group (TC/WG). International standards should be referred to directly, wherever possible. All information on or relating to the draft standard (before its publication), proceedings and work papers of the TC/WG shall be treated as confidential information, and the TC/WG members are not to disclose the confidential information without the permission of the TC/WG.

The draft standard shall be approved by the relevant Technical Committee (TC) (or Standards Committee in the absence of TC) prior to public comment. It shall be approved by the Standards Committee either during or after the public comment. For a Technical Reference which does not need to go through a 2-month public comment before publication, it shall be endorsed by the relevant Standards Committee.

Public Comment

The following shall be released for public comment to notify the industry of new developments and to gather feedback:

​new work commencement;

initiation of review;

draft of new and revised Singapore Standards (SS);

draft amendment; and

proposed withdrawal

The period for public comment is two months except for review initiation and new work commencement which is only one month. Public comment documents shall be proof- read by the relevant Technical Committee / Working Group (TC/WG) before the release of the document for public comment.

All public comments received must be considered by the TC/WG and the response to be provided within 1 month. If the comment is considered valid by the TC and results in technical changes, the draft shall be re-submitted for public comments and to the Standards Committee for approval. Public comment also applies to adoption of international standards.

Approval of Standards

The voting conditions for approval of draft standard by Technical Committee/Working Group (TC/WG) and Standards Committee are as follows:

Voting is to be done through balloting, at meetings or e-voting through the standards website. Members absent at meetings should be given forms to exercise voting by a given date.

The entitlement to vote is as follows:

1. Chairman or Convenor

One vote

2. Deputy Chairman or Deputy Convenor

One vote

3. Ex-officio of Standards Council

One vote

4. Each Member
If there are more than one member from the same organisation, only one vote is allocated to the organisation

One vote

The draft standard is approved under the following conditions:

a) At least two-thirds of those who are eligible for voting must cast their votes.

Otherwise, the motion will lapse unless the voting period is extended.

b) Votes cast in favour and negative votes accompanied by technical reasons are considered as valid votes whilst abstained votes and negative votes not accompanied by technical reasons are considered as invalid votes.

c) Two-thirds of the valid votes cast have to be in favour for the proposal to be approved or endorsed.

Comments received after the normal voting period are submitted to the committee or working group secretariat for consideration at the time of the next review of the Standard.

Timeframe for Development of Standards

The following timeframe for establishment and review of Singapore Standards should be adhered to:

Type of Document

Development time

General product specifications* including fully adopted from international standards

6 - 12 months

Codes of practice

12 - 24 months

NOTE: * Include guides and test methods. Technical Reference, being a fast track document, should be developed within 12 months.

All Technical Committee/Working Group (TC/WG) decisions whether or not to move to the next stage of the development process shall be documented.

Editing and Publication

The responsibility of the technical content of a draft standard remains with the Technical Committee/Working Group. All final draft Singapore Standards / Technical References should be edited and proof-read prior to publication. All intellectual property rights including copyright in any works created by Standards Partners are the property of and belong to SPRING Singapore. SPRING Singapore provides editing service on all proposed Singapore Standards / Technical References.

Gazette

All Singapore Standards which have undergone Stages 1 to 6 and approval by the respective Standards Committee shall be notified in the Government Gazette and printed. Technical References are not gazetted as they are only pre-standards.

Maintenance

Every standard shall be under the responsibility of a Technical Committee (TC) (or Standards Committee in the absence of a TC). Each TC shall maintain standards for which it is responsible, to ensure that those standards are up to date with current practice and free from material error.